


Broken Bones (they come with the job, darling)

by elyhandra



Series: Nope, Never Again (Until Next Time) [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Genre: Gen, Pre-Canon, Rated M for language, short stories that happen before the events of TES:III and TES:IV, the Nerevarine had a life before becoming a hero
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-26
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2019-04-28 06:02:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14442915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elyhandra/pseuds/elyhandra
Summary: Before becoming a hero, Urania lived many adventures. Some were funny, and some even had a good ending.Adventuring - and thieving - isn't easy, but at least there's a priest to help her heal her bones.





	Broken Bones (they come with the job, darling)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Little_buttercup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Little_buttercup/gifts).



> This story is told by chapters, each a different adventure, leading up to the events of my fic "Nope".   
> I'm sorry I haven't updated that one in a while, it's been tough at the university...
> 
> Anyway, as always, this fic is dedicated to my good friend Little_buttercup, who is a sweetheart and keeps me going!

 

Adventuring was an honest way of life. If you were lucky, by the time you were finished exploring a ruin, you would have a bag full of Ayleid trinkets, gold, some gems, the occasional enchanted weapon, and maybe some Welkynd stones.

 

Oh, and bruises. And broken bones. And cuts. And diseases – blame the fucking rats, and the fucking zombies and-

 

Well, you get the picture.

 

Hey, if it were easy, everyone would be an adventurer. And Urania needed the money it brought. Well, that’s not true – what she needed was to explain her gains. After all, thieving was still forbidden, and Urania needed an explanation for some of her… let’s say more _extravagant_ items. Like her enchanted leather armor with chameleon spells ( _definitely NOT_ meant for stealing), or the absurd amounts of septims she had to pay to keep her weapons enchanted (they called _her_ a thief, but the real crime was how much the damned mages demanded for a recharged weapon, _seriously_ ).

 

Still, adventuring wasn’t that much of an impossible task, even counting the wounds. Most of the time, the biggest problem Urania encountered was a well-armed skeleton, a wraith or a large ring of bandits. The first were easy, you just avoided the weapons and smacked them hard on the spine; the second was a challenge, but not impossible – she did pay for enchanted silver swords for this purpose alone; and the third was just _good fun_. When she stepped into a ruin, and she heard voices recounting raids and loot, Urania smiled – and used her chameleon gear to steal _everything_ right from _under their noses_. Hey, a thief who steals from another thief suffers the same fate in eyes of the Aedra!

 

As long as the bandits weren’t members of the Guild, it was all just a great test to her skills. And besides, no matter how many rough encounters she had, Urania avoided killing anyone on the job, even in the ruins. Hell, Urania herself lived a life of crime – judging bandits for doing the same was just hypocritical.

 

Unless they were necromancers.

 

_Fucking necromancers_.

 

_She fucking hated them!_

 

Who _the fuck_ gave them the right to desecrate the bodies of the dead?! To toy with something so sacred – the right of dignity in death, the right to command their own body. _No one gave a shit if they were dead_ – if the fuckers didn’t have written permission from the spirit whose body they were playing with, then this shit was a **HELL NO** in Urania’s book.

 

And this particular ruin was _crawling_ with the fuckers. “Garlas Agea” read the inscription on the entry to the ruin, meaning “Cavern of Secrets”. More like Cavern of _Secretly a Necromancer Hideout!_

 

Urania stayed very still, listening behind a pillar, concealed in the shadow it offered, and bared her teeth in challenge. Necromancer lairs were a “hit, run and burn” kind of job: kill the necromancer, run from the zombies, burn everything that existed in the place; repeat as long as a Worm acolyte still lived, or the remains were not on fire. Burn the rats too, if they showed up. You never knew what diseases the dead carried, and she never felt complacent when she saw the rotting bodies.

 

Whenever a corpse walked, Urania ended up setting entire ruins on _fire_.

 

_“It’s the one good Dunmer trait I have,_ ” she thought as she readied her silver longsword, _“fire comes naturally to my fingertips.”_ Her birthsign, the Lady, meant she had a decent amount of magicka available for burning shit to the ground. Times like these got Urania wishing her ancestors came to her as they did to other Dunmer. But no – never had a ghost answered her calls for help.

 

No matter. She had shit to burn.

 

Coming from behind the pillar, Urania jumped at the nearest conjurer and cut his head off before he even noticed her. Before she could scan the room to see where the other necromancer had gone, a zombie started charging at her, growling and walking unsteadily. She started to run sideways, keeping one eye on the corpse, and lunged for the other acolyte. The mer, an Altmer (it _had_ to be, didn’t he) conjured a skeleton and started throwing lightning bolts in her direction.

 

She evaded the first bolt and yelped when the second hit her. “ _Thank Azura for leather armor, anything with metal and I would be shocked to the Nines!_ ”

 

Turning around, Urania swung her sword at the zombie, slicing its chest open; she pulled her sword back, thrust it into its dead heart, and kicked the corpse into the ground. She pulled her sword back as she turned back to the necromancer, and yelled ”Is that all you’ve got?!”

 

It wasn’t.

 

The Altmer raised his hands, and before she could charge at him, a conjuring hole appeared between them, and from it stepped a daedra.

 

Not just any daedra – a Dremora.

 

“Oh,” she muttered, “Shit.”

 

The Dremora growled and charged at her, waving a deadly looking mace at her head. She dodged the blow, and sprinted into the ruin – it wasn’t possible to fight a Dremora _and_ a necromancer at the same time, it just _wasn’t_. She kept looking around for a door she could lock, or something that would give her some advantage over the Daedra, and almost ran into a wall.

 

A dead end.

 

Cursing, Urania turned and readied her sword, in time to block the descending mace from hitting her. She deflected blow after blow it threw at her, grinding her teeth every time their weapons clashed, feeling her arms hurting and hearing her sword straining against the onslaught of blows.

 

She needed to move – silver swords were not made to fight against daedric maces, and she had no space to maneuver around the dremora. If she didn’t get away fast, she was going to be dead and worse: _zombified_.

 

Urania raised her sword, thinking of every bit of sword-fighting training she had received from the Blades, and bared her teeth at the dremora, thinking of a fight she had had with Jauffre, so many years ago. She filled her lungs with air, called upon her magicka, and let out a battle cry.

 

The dremora backed away, disorientated, and Urania stricked at him, going for the neck. The daedra’s head did not separate from its shoulders, but the damned being got sent back to Oblivion.

 

Urania fell to the ground, shaking and trying to catch her breath.

 

“Nord blood,” Jauffre had said, when she had used it for the first time, “it’s extremely rare for a dunmer to cast it, but given that you cannot conjure your ancestors, I would wager you had a Nord father. It’s probably why your mother left you with us.”

 

She had stricken him for that comment, a punch right in the nose. And it had healed crooked.

 

Rising to her feet, Urania shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers, trying to focus. The Blades were no longer a part of her life, and she still had a necromancer to kill.

 

With a critical look at her sword, she carefully advanced back onto the main chamber, praying the necromancer thought her dead and that she would catch him unware. She sneaked into the chamber, trying to locate the mage, and-

 

Another dremora leapt at her, screaming with a mace. She tried to move out of the way, but the mace caught her leg. She rolled away and got up, feeling her right leg throb with pain. _“Ignore it, ignore it, just ignore it until you can do something about it!”_

“Revenge!,” it growled, “flee again, mortal!”

 

“Wait, you’re the same I just beat?!,” she retorted, shocked, “That’s not fair!,” she yelled at the dremora, blocking blow- “I already killed you once!” – after blow – “Go back to Oblivion!” – after blow – “Why are you here, obeying the orders of a puny Altmer,” – after blow – “when you could be serving your Lord, I don’t know which one, probably Dagon!,” – after blow – “ or Molag Bal!, and instead you’re here!”

 

The dremora stopped hitting at her and growled, staring at her. “Is that what you want, for this Altmer to conjure you again and again? Do you serve him?,” she pressed, sensing its anger.

 

“Daedra! Kill this Dunmer at once!” yelled the necromancer, haughtily.

 

The dremora bared its teeth, and Urania did the same. “I beat you once,” she growled low, “and I will do it again. So tell me – do you want to go back to Oblivion in shame, and keep serving that elf, or do you want to do something about it?”

 

The dremora raised its mace, swung it in an arc over its head, turned quickly and threw it at the Altmer. The mage cried and fell to the ground, bleeding from the wound.

 

“It was a good fight,” the dremora said, looking at her, “no shame in it.” And then it disappeared back to Oblivion.

 

Urania stood still, sword still drawn, looking at the spot where the dremora had vanished. She was dumbstruck.

 

“That worked? Seriously?! That worked?! _What_?!” she asked out loud.

 

Her leg flared in pain, and she let herself fall, hearing her sword clatter to the ground. It took her a few breaths, but when she felt the pain waver, she dragged herself into the dead necromancer’s body, and searched his pockets. Just as she suspected, he carried some potions with him, and she swallowed them as soon as she read the label, making sure it wasn’t poison. She grimaced at the feeling of burning in her chest, guessing she was going to need medical attention for elixirs she was taking, as well as the leg.

 

Then, she searched his neck, and there – an amulet with the shape of a crystal. An old family heirloom, that belonged to an old lady who had disappeared in this ruins, and the reason she had been contracted for the job. She pocketed it as well.

 

Now, she needed to get out of the ruin.

 

And that was going to be an adventure altogether.

 

-

 

Leaving the ruin while carrying her pack was a task that took nearly two hours. She had ditched most of the looted weapons, keeping only the lighter loot, Welkynd stones and her swords, and swallowed two more potions in the meantime. She had to save her storage – Garlas Agea was somewhere in between Kvatch and Anvil, and she had to reach a city before her potions ran out – no telling if she would be able to survive if she did not.

 

Using the necromancer’s staff as a cane, she slowly made her way towards the road, hoping to find a carriage, or anyone else traveling the road that could lend her some help.

 

Urania had to decide where to go, and quickly – on a good day, Kvatch would be the better option: The Mages Guild was richer, and payed more for magical artifacts from ruins, and there were more shops where she could get deals on little trinkets. But Kvatch sat atop a rocky formation, and her leg was busted; there was no way she would be able to make the trek up the path to the city alone. And people in Kvatch tended to mind their own business – a big city had no shortage of beggars and liars, all waiting to deceive a traveler.

 

Anvil it was, then.

 

Urania turned west, and started following the road to Anvil, carefully placing her right leg along with the staff, trying to lessen the pain it caused.

 

The sun was setting, marking the end of the day, and the Dunmer was still very far from the city. She could feel a fever starting to rise, probably due to the unchecked number of potions she had taken, and her gait was becoming unsteady, with her leg throbbing with very step she took.

 

Panting, Urania stopped in the middle of the road, trying to catch her breath. If she sat down now, she might not be able to get up and continue, but the sun was setting, her leg was a disaster which needed to be tended to, and she had run out of potions to keep her going. None of her options were looking good, and she was at a loss at what to do.

 

She clutched her amulet of Talos between her fingers, thinking of worse days on the road – right after she had left the Blades, back before she had joined the Thieves Guild, and before she had any sort of reputation. Out of all the things she could have kept, the amulet had managed to stay with her. Probably because Talin had given it to her, or probably because amongst everyone in the Temple, the ninth Divine had been the only one who hadn’t said anything nasty to her. In any case, in times of trouble, Urania found herself speaking to the amulet, telling self-depreciating jokes, complaining about the people she encountered and thinking about her life choices. It was a habit she had developed after weeks alone – talking to yourself will get you mad, but talking to Talos is considered prayer, right?

 

“Another day, another fuck-up. Now what, Talos?,” she asked the amulet. “There’s no way to keep going, but if I don’t, it’ll only get worse. What say you, forwards, or stopping? What to do, what to do…”

 

“Is everything alright, citizen?”

 

Urania yelped and turned around suddenly, causing her leg to complain. She bent over her waist, clutching the staff and hoping to still look somewhat presentable.

 

“Sorry, sir, but I fear I’m in a worse state than I thought, and I didn’t even hear you come near,” Urania answered. She looked up, trying to see the face of the Imperial Legion forester who had happened upon her. His face was partially hidden by the helmet he wore, and the torch he carried seemed to cast more shadows in is face than light anything. “If I could ask your help… You see, I’m an adventurer, and got involved in a fight in an old ruin east of here, full of necromancers. I’m injured, and I think I won’t be able to reach any city.” She stopped and looked at him, waiting for his reaction. When he said noting, Urania swallowed her pride, and asked “Could you help me get to a city chapel? I’m dying.”

 

The legionnaire gave a little nudge at the horse to come closer to her. For a brief moment, Urania thought he was going to just circle around her and keep going, but he dismounted next to her, and helped her get on the saddle of his mount. She tried not to whimper, but the pain was overriding everything. Now that help had arrived, she was having trouble to keep her eyelids from closing.

 

She felt the soldier hop onto the horse as well, and leaned into him.

 

“Thank you, Talos, for hearing my prayers,” she said.

 

She did not hear the answer the man gave her.

 

-

 

The next time Urania opened her eyes, there was a ceiling above her, and a pair of bright blue eyes peering down at her. She closed them, trying to remember what happened. The ruin, the fight, the painful walk, the guard… Was she in the chapel of Dibella, in Anvil?

 

She blinked a few times, trying to get her eyes to focus, and stared at the man who was looking down at her.

 

“How are you feeling?,” the man asked her.

 

“Handsome.” She said to him.

 

He looked at her in concern and said, “I think you might have a concussion.”

 

“No. You’re handsome,” Urania responded, “and I’m feeling like a dremora bashed me. With a mace. And it did, so I guess I feel like that.”

 

He looked dumbstruck for a moment, and then shook his said, muttering “Gets here almost dead, and then starts to flirt with everyone not one second after waking up,” he said, smiling, “Are you sure you weren’t hit in the head?”

 

“Pretty positive,” she said, giving him her best smile. Priests of Dibella always liked smiles.

 

The priest chuckled and moved to help her sit in the cot where she was laying. He looked young, possibly in his late twenties or early thirties, with dark brown hair and a pale complexion that would tan under the sun; something about his face was vaguely familiar to her, as if she ought to remember him.

 

He kneeled beside her and pushed the blanket that covered her away. “I’m going to check the state of your injuries, to see if they need any immediate care. I don’t want to give you another potion, you were very sick from them. I cast some healing spells on your leg, but I didn’t want to cast anything big – aside from the broken bones, there was no sign of disease or infection, and I wanted to let you rest. I might need to cast them now,” he said. He looked her in the eye, and said, in a soothing tone, “it will hurt, but I can make sure there’s no permanent damage. I need your consent for it, though.”

 

“Please,” she said, “if there’s a chance I can go back to full health, with no future penalty, then please, please heal me. Yes, I consent.”

 

He nodded, and handed her a piece of leather, which she bit. He placed his hands over her thigh, closed his (beautiful) eyes, and light started seeping from his palms, and into her leg.

 

And then the pain came.

 

It _hurt_. Urania bit hard into the leather, closing her eyelids and grabbing the fabric of the thin mattress, fighting her impulse to scream and get away from the pain. And it felt like it never ended.

 

It must’ve taken less than three minutes, but by the end of it, Urania was sweating and shaking, her fingers hurt, her leg felt worse than after being hit, and her vision was blurry. The priest leaned over her again, asking her if she was alright, and passed a wet rag over her forehead, cleaning the beads of sweat that were dripping from her hairline. He pried the piece of leather from her mouth and helped her drink some water.

 

“Wow,” Urania muttered, “that’ll teach me not to mess with daedra.” She started coughing violently, and the priest helped her up, tapping her back to help her cough.

 

When she felt better, the priest lowered her back onto her cot, and placed her blanket over again. "I don't mean to pry," he said, "but I can't help but wonder about what happened to you. You said you had an encounter with a daedra?"

 

The priest looked genuinely confused and worried, and since she did owe him her life, Urania felt the need to explain her (mis)adventure.

 

"Ah, well, you know, risks of the business. I'm an adventurer, you see? I go dungeon diving, map out old Ayleid ruins, abandoned forts, the occasional cave. Sometimes, it's a scholar who wants details on a particular ruin; sometimes, it's a merchant who lost his cargo to bandits, and this time, it was a woman, an old lady who had lived her whole life in a farm, a few miles outside of the city." When the priest did not interrupt her, just nodding along, Urania continued. "As it turns out, there was an old ruin nearby, and a bunch of necromancers decided to make it their hideout... And they killed the lady. Her son was away when it happened and could do nothing about it. He came to town, asking the guards for help, but they told him to report to the Legion, and the Legion told him to report to the city guard – the thing is, no one wanted to deal with a necromancer lair. I was at the The Count's Arms when the boy came in, looking to drink himself into a stupor. I was half drunk myself, I confess – it's been a few hard times, and the whole town is in an uproar with the disappearance of the Countess's husband...but I digress."

 

The priest was looking confused, but made no move to stop her from telling her story, so she kept telling him everything.

 

"Anyway, he comes in, drinks and cries and tell us how no one will help him, and I just hate necromancers as well, you know? Well, long story short, I told him I would clear it out, and try to find his mother's necklace, so at least he'd have that from her. And..."

 

Urania paused again. So far, she sounded completely heroic – which was pathetic, but the man's attention was getting at her, and he had saved her life, so she felt like she owed him the truth. Besides, she might not be recognizing him right now, but Anvil wasn't that big, and if she planned on coming back, then it wasn't a good idea to keep the worst of the story out. 

 

"Well, it's a bit unsavory to say next, but I needed the money, and these ruins are usually brimming with hidden treasures, so I figured I'd be set for nearly a month. So, in I go, about to wreck vengeance on the bunch... It went pretty well at first, and I was able to... errr... dispose of them cleanly without them realizing it... until the last two.  And then one of them conjures a dremora."

 

The priest kept looking at her with wide eyes, mouth hanging slightly open, both in shock and awe. Urania felt like he wasn't judging her, which... tended to be the standard way priests regarded her. And this was a really nice change.

 

"So," Urania says, finishing her tale, "I was on the road back here to Anvil, and in comes this legion forester, and he gave a ride here, back to the city. Which reminds me, I need to go thank that man. And I have to go tell the kid I found the amulet."

 

The priest was silent for a few moments, pressing his lips into a thin line. He blew out a breath, and said, "Well, that is quite the tale. I believe you, but there's just a small little problem with it, and you'll have to forgive me, since I didn't tell you before." Urania looked confused at the priest, and gestured that he should continue. "The thing is, I would be very glad to inform the lad and call him here... But we are in Kvatch.”

 

"What," Urania said, "what?"

 

"We are not in Anvil," the priest repeated, with a small embarrassed smile, "we are in Kvatch, at the Great Chapel of Akatosh."

 

Urania was silent, as her mistake registered.

 

Her stomach _sank_.

 

She had been _flirting_ with a priest of Akatosh. Not of Dibella, _Akatosh_!!

 

"Oh, Aedra and Daedra," she said, mortified, "I'm so sorry. Oh Gods, I'm so, so sorry! I was flirting with you –  I thought you were a priest of Dibella and that I was allowed, and you didn't really look affronted, so I thought it was okay, but it's not, and I must have made you uncomfortable, and I'm so sorry!!" Urania kept rambling on, sinking herself further into a Hole of Shame, feeling her face getting redder as embarrassment settled in and made itself at home in her chest.

 

"Calm down, please, it's okay! I mean-," he started stumbling on his words as well, as he tried to reassure her, and looking a bit embarrassed himself, "it's not okay, or rather, it's not like that in Akatosh’es order, but I'm not offended, I was just surprised!" They both were quiet for a few moments, as both stopped to try and pretend they weren't embarrassed. "You were not disrespectful," he repeated, "you were… you were very funny."

 

Urania stared at him. Funny. She had been _funny_ as she _flirted_ with him! A priest of _Akatosh!_

 

_Azura have MERCY on her soul!_

 

Urania rubbed her face with her palms, willing the blush to disappear. When she felt more composed, she dared to grin at the priest, who was still smiling.

 

“So, not offended. Alright. Tell you what, next time I wake up after passing out, the first thing I’ll do is ask permission to flirt with my healers!”

 

The priest laughed heartily, and said “Yes, I think that’s the lesson to take from this: flirting with a priest only after head trauma and permission. That, and not to mess with a dremora!” He wiped his face with his hand, and added, “I’m brother Martin, by the way.”

 

“I’m Urania.”  Urania extended her hand towards him, accepting the greeting, and immediately decided she trusted him enough to tell him her name. “So, brother Martin,” she said, “next time I wake up here, can I flirt with you?”

 

“How many times are you planning on waking up here with broken bones?” he asked, trying to evade her question.

 

Urania grinned at him. “Broken bones come with the job, darling. You can expect to see me every few months!”

 

Brother Martin flushed, and Urania would be lying if she said she didn’t either.

 


End file.
